sidewalks, so that his feet would soon have been soaked,
even had there been no holes in his shoes.

Jurgis had had enough to eat in the jail, and the work
had been the least trying of any that he had done since he
came to Chicago; but even so, he had not grown strong
-- the fear and grief that had preyed upon his mind had
worn him thin. Now he shivered and shrunk from the
rain, hiding his hands in his pockets and hunching his
shoulders together. The Bridewell grounds were on the
outskirts of the city and the country around them was
unsettled and wild -- on one side was the big drainage
canal, and on the other a maze of railroad tracks, and so
the wind had full sweep.

After walking a ways, Jurgis met a little ragamuffin
whom he hailed: "Hey, sonny!"

The boy cocked one eye at him -- he knew that Jurgis
was a "jail bird" by his shaven head. "Wot yer want?"
he queried.

"How do you go to the stockyards?" Jurgis de~
manded.

"I don't go," replied the boy.

Jurgis hesitated a moment, nonplussed. Then he said,
"I mean which is the way?"

"Why don't yer say so then?" was the response, and
the boy pointed to the northwest, across the tracks.
"That way."

"How far is it?" Jurgis asked.

"I dunno," said the other. "Mebbe twenty miles or
so."

"Twenty miles!" Jurgis echoed, and his face fell. He
had to walk every foot of it, for they had turned him out
of jail without a penny in his pockets.

Yet, when he once got started, and his blood had
warmed with walking, he forgot everything in the fever
of his thoughts. All the dreadful imaginations that had
haunted him in his cell now rushed into his mind at once.
The agony was almost over -- he was going to find out;
and he clenched his hands in his pockets as he strode, fol~
lowing his flying desire, almost at a run. Ona -- the

[[206]]

p205 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p206w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p207

v?